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Tracking Challenge One - The case of the 'Angel Wings'. Clues: You can see the tracks of some sort of animal walking through the snow -- it was traveling from right to left, and then its tracks abruptly disappear where you see them end in the middle of the picture. Where they end, they were surrounded by the sharp, pointy 'angel' wing pattern. Unfortunately there is nothing to give you a sense of size in this picture, but you can imagine that the edges of the 'angel wings' are about one meter long from edge to edge. Because of a fresh snowfall during the night, these tracks were probably made very early in the morning -- maybe even before the sun rose. Solution is found below!
Solution: What we’re seeing here is a large raptor swooping down and grabbing the prey in its talons. The splayed 'angel wing' marks are the wing-tips of the bird, and the tracks disappear because the prey was carried away into the air. The prey looks large, but we’re seeing its entire body-width outlined in the snow. If you could look straight down into the tracks, you’d see odd prints that are very easy to identify – a small opossum. The opossum was walking along when our large raptor (likely a Great-Horned Owl) swooped down and carried it off for dinner.
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